Understanding conflict penality: Dominant themes and the case of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict

Abstract

Confinement is a common result of conflict, and states use various mechanisms to imprison enemy fighters. This article examines practices of incarceration in times of conflict as punishment. It analyses dominant themes in how states punish those they conceive as ‘enemies’ and proposes the term ‘conflict penality’ to encapsulate commonalities in state punishment during conflict. The article then discusses conflict penality further by examining Israel's punishment of Palestinians for ‘security offences’. The article contributes to the geographical and topical expansion of punishment studies, beyond the traditional borders of national criminal justice systems of Anglo-European countries. It concludes by showing how, under the extreme political climate of conflict, states use penal power to delegitimise their opponents, yet do so through extensive normative compromises that undermine their moral authority to punish.